Immigrant Rights are Worker Rights and Human Rights!


The Fruit of Labor World Cultural Center understands that worldwide corporate capitalism and imperialism produce exploitation, oppression, wars, and other conditions that produce the deadly conditions that force working people to immigrate and migrate. Immigrant and migrant workers like all workers want the internationally recognized HUMAN RIGHT to live a better life!


"Historically, we know why many of our enslaved African people...our ancestors escaped the exploitation of white supremacist southern plantations with its oppressive white supremacist and deadly institutions. As our people fled and escaped to the U.S. north, Mexico and Canada, we sought a better life"!


Thanks to all our friends and allies who stood with us and challenged NC legislators, Governor Roy Cooper and our community members to stand with North Carolina families in vetoing the anti-immigrant SB101 Bill! Here are some words from our friends and members of the Immigrants' Rights Alliance of North Carolina:

 

“Anti-immigrant bills like HB 370 and SB 101 have no place in our legislature, these attacks on immigrant communities are racist and outdated. SB 101 has joined the list of anti-immigrant bills that have been defeated thanks to the work of immigrant activists and allies,” said Martha Hernandez, member of Comite de Accion Popular (CAP).

 

“SB 101 was an effort to rally anti-immigrant sentiments ahead of the upcoming elections. We’re glad the Governor did right by his immigrant constituents and vetoed SB 101,“ said Iliana Santillan, Executive Director of El Pueblo. “We’re thankful for our community for fighting against this anti-immigrant bill. The defeat of SB 101 happened because of community efforts.”

 

“SB 101 was a blatant retaliation attempt against voters who elected sheriffs that fulfilled their promises to end voluntary partnerships with ICE,” said Stefania Arteaga, Campaign Strategist for the ACLU of North Carolina. “We are thankful Governor Cooper used his power to protect immigrant communities once again from attacks by anti-immigrant lawmakers.”

The Smell of Money Screening in Rocky Mount, NC.



Hosted by the North Carolina Environmental Justice Network


Join NCEJN for a special community screening of The Smell of Money, a film about the pork industry’s impacts on Eastern North Carolina communities.

 

The FREE event will feature a light lunch, film screening, discussion with the filmmakers and community advocates, live music, and info fair. Donations to the North Carolina Environmental Justice Network are appreciated and can be made at ncejn.org/donate.

 

August 13, 2022, 12pm - 5pm

Film screening to follow lunch at 1:30 PM

Truth Tabernacle Ministries, 704 Arlington St. Rocky Mount, NC

 

RSVP EARLY at bit.ly/tsom-ncejn 


About the Film


“The smell of money”—that’s what Big Pork calls the stench of pig waste in the air in eastern North Carolina, where much of the world’s bacon and barbecue is made. But to Elsie Herring and others who live near the state’s giant pig factories, the revolting odor is a call to battle against generations of injustice.

 

A story about the power of love for one’s family and community to triumph over even the largest forces of injustice, The Smell of Money calls upon viewers to see the people behind what's on our plates––and to join the fight for a better future for us all.

 

Watch the trailer and learn more at smellofmoneydoc.com.

Recommended Read


Sister Mother Warrior 

by Vanessa Riley


The acclaimed author of Island Queen Vanessa Riley brings readers a vivid, sweeping novel of the Haitian Revolution based on the true-life stories of two extraordinary women: the first Empress of Haiti, Marie-Claire Bonheur, and Gran Toya, a West African-born warrior who helped lead the rebellion that drove out the French and freed the enslaved people of Haiti. Gran Toya: Born in West Africa, Abdaraya Toya was one of the legendary minos—women called “Dahomeyan Amazons” by the Europeans—who were specially chosen female warriors consecrated to the King of Dahomey.


Betrayed by an enemy, kidnapped, and sold into slavery, Toya wound up in the French colony of Saint Domingue, where she became a force to be reckoned with on its sugar plantations: a healer and an authority figure among the enslaved. Among the motherless children, she helped raise was a man who would become the revolutionary Jean-Jacques Dessalines. Read more here.

September 23-25, 2022 RISING MAJORITY/RM Membership Convergence

in Durham, NC: Building a Vision to Free Our People.


The convergence will take place September 23-25 in Durham, North Carolina and will focus on the road to building a 2050 Vision and 10 Year Strategy. 


We understand that now more than ever, we must work towards greater clarity and bold vision. Will you join RM? If so, please RSVP here, and a formal invitation and registration form will follow soon!


The RISING MAJORITY alliance's Organizing Team will reach out to your organization soon to share more details about the convergence, any needs your team might have and representation from your organization.

MAY OUR PEOPLE TRIUMPH


By Patrice Lumumba (2 July 1925 – 17 January 1961) 


Weep, O my black beloved brother deep buried in eternal, bestial night.

O you, whose dust simooms and hurricanes have scattered all over the vast earth,

You, by whose hands the pyramids were reared

In memory of royal murderers,

You, rounded up in raids; you, countless times defeated

In all the battles ever won by brutal force;

You, who were taught but one perpetual lesson,

One motto, which was—slavery or death;

You, who lay hidden in impenetrable jungles

And silently succumbed to countless deaths

Under the ugly guise of jungle fever,

Or lurking in the tiger's fatal jaws,

Or in the slow embrace of the morass

That strangled gradually, like the python....

But then, there came a day that brought the while,

More sly, more full of spite than any death.

Your gold he bartered for his worthless beads and baubles,

He raped and fouled your sisters and your wives,

And poisoned with his drink your sons and brothers,

And drove your children down into the holds of ships.

'Twas then the tomtom rolled from village unto village,

And told the people that another foreign slave ship

Had put off on its way to far-off shores

Where God is cotton, where the dollar reigns as King.

There, sentenced to unending, wracking labour,

Toiling from dawn to dusk in the relentless sun,

They taught you in your psalms to glorify

Their Lord, while you yourself were crucified to hymns

That promised bliss in the world of Hereafter,

While you—you begged of them a single boon:

That they should let you live—to live, aye—simply

live. And by a fire your dim, fantastic dreams

Poured out aloud in melancholy strains,

As elemental and as wordless as your anguish.

 It happened you would even play, be merry

And dance, in sheer exuberance of spirit:

And then would all the splendour of your manhood,

 The sweet desires of youth sound, wild with power,

On strings of brass, in burning tambourines.

And from that mighty music the beginning

Of jazz arose, tempestuous, capricious,

Declaring to the whites in accents loud

That not entirely was the planet theirs.

O Music, it was you permitted us

To lift our face and peer into the eyes

Of future liberty, that would one day be ours.

Then let the shores of mighty rivers bearing on

Their living waves into the radiant future,

O brother mine, be yours!

Let the fierce heat of the relentless middaysun

Burn up your grief!

Let them evaporate in everlasting sunshine,

Those tears shed by your father and your grandsire

Tortured to death upon these mournful fields.

And may our people, free and gay forever,

Live, triumph, thrive in peace in this our Congo,

Here, in the very heart of our great Africa!